The present invention relates to inflatable tubes used as building partitions and particularly relates to inflatable tubes used as a temporary ceiling in a greenhouse.
The recent restrictions on energy availability and the emphasis on energy conservation have had a large impact on the horticultural industry. Specifically, on those plant growers who must rely upon the use of a greenhouse in order to produce and properly maintain plants. Therefore, even though present day greenhouses are being designed with energy conservation in mind, the vast majority of existing greenhouses are not particularly energy efficient.
It has been found that one effective approach toward lessening the amount of energy required to heat the interior of a greenhouse is to provide insulated wall curtains. Another approach is to provide a lowered ceiling, so as to lessen the interior volume of the greenhouse which must be heated. Recently, it has also been proposed to provide plastic side curtains and ceilings which permit sunlight to enter the greenhouse, while still reducing the interior volume of the greenhouse so that the heating facility used to heat the greenhouse interior has a reduced load.
Present approaches toward obtaining a more thermally efficient greenhouse suffer from several drawbacks, not the least of which is the complexity of the systems needed in order to block off portions of the greenhouse interior. Such complexity is manifested in the number of parts required in assembling the movable walls and ceilings. Obviously, systems which are intended to reduce heating costs must themselves be relatively economical to purchase, otherwise the situation becomes self-defeating. Another drawback found in present artificial ceilings is that when the ceilings are not actively reducing the greenhouse interior volume, the artificial ceiling blocks or interferes with the normal admission of sunlight into the interior of the greenhouse. This then severely hampers the initial purpose of the greenhouse.